A tight ball of workers attempting to sting or bite a queen; distinguished from normal queen retinue or swarming behavior. Secondary balling may also occur near the ball around the queen, but with a worker at the center; this is likely due to the worker being too closely connected to the balled queen’s pheromones. Balling usually results in death of queen.
Bees may also use balling to confine and kill an invader such as a hornet or wasp.
Several to many (15–50) worker bees tightly gather around a queen, seeking to suffocate, bite, or sting her. On occasion, a large, compact bee ball may elevate the temperature and cause death of a queen (and some balling workers) via dehydration or overheating. Whether balling is primarily an effort to kill or isolate a “foreign” queen, or perhaps protect a queen from a second (related) queen in vicinity, is unknown. Surviving queens may be injured and subsequently replaced by supersedure.
Balling is most often observed in banked queens and with direct queen introduction (i.e., direct release of queen into a hive from her shipping cage). Check the behavior of bees on the outside of a cage before her release: if they seem agitated and are biting at the cage, then balling (and killing) may result if she is released. Worker bees involved in balling may be subsequently balled by other workers.
Workers may also ball enemies such as hornets or other wasps to kill them. A photo at right shows eastern honey bees (Apis cerana) balling a hornet.
Attendants with queen but with bees more tightly adhering to queen; usurpation; supersedure
Mangum W. 2018. Usurpation: A Colony Taken Over by a Foreign Swarm. American Bee Journal 159(5): 537-541. https://bluetoad.com/publication/?i=580808&p=57&view=issueViewer and https://bluetoad.com/publication/?m=5417&i=580808&view=articleBrowser&article_id=3356173&ver=html5
Gerula D, et al. 2018. Balling Behavior of Workers Toward Honey Bee Queens Returning from Mating Flights. Journal of Apicultural Science 62(2):247-256. https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/jas-2018-0023
